The Church

So with that, I thought I'd take a final walk
The tide of public opinion had started to abate
The neighbours, bless them, had turned out to be all talk
I could see their frightened faces
Peering at me through the gateI was looking for an end to this, for some kind of closure
Time moved so rapidly, I had no hope of keeping track of it
And I thought of my friends who had died of exposure
And I remembered other ones who had died from the lack of itAnd in my best shoes, I started falling forward down the street
Stopped at a church and jostled through the crowd
Love followed just behind me, panting at my feet
As the steeple tore the stomach from a lonely little cloudInside I sat, seeking the presence of a God
I searched through the pictures in a leather bound book
And I found a woolly lamb dozing in an issue of blood
And a gilled Jesus shivering on a fisherman's hookAnd babe
It seems so long
Since you've been gone, away
And I
Just got to say
That it grows darker with the dayBack on the street, I saw a great big smiling sun
It was a good day and an evil day and all was bright and new
It seemed to me that most destruction was being done
By those who could not choose between the twoAmateurs, dilettantes, hacks, cowboys, clones
The streets groan with little Caesars, Napoleons and cunts
With their building blocks and their tiny plastic phones
Counting on their fingers, with a crumbs down their frontsI passed by your garden, saw you with your flowers
The Camellias, Magnolias and Azaleas so sweet
And I stood there invisible in the panicking crowds
You looked so beautiful in the rising heatI smell smoke, see little fires bursting on the lawns
People carry on regardless, listening to their hands
Great cracks appear in the pavement, the earth yawns
Bored and disgusted, to do us downBabe
It seems so long
Since you've been gone, you went away
And I
Just got to say
That it grows darker with the dayAll these streets are frozen now, I come and go
Full of a longing for something I do not know
My father sits slumped in the deepening snow
As I search, in and out, above, about and belowIt seems so long
Since you've been gone and you went away
And I
Opened and pray
That it grows darker with the day